You know to call 911 in a medical emergency, but what should you do when your gadgets face a similar life-or-death scenario? If you spill coffee on your laptop, for instance, reacting quickly could save your hardware and data. The correct procedure-such as dismantling your laptop's keyboard or installing an inexpensive replacement battery in your iPod-can save your faltering hardware, giving it another chance to age gracefully. And the laptops, cameras, cell phones, and iPods of the world will thank you.

Here we present a series of nine articles on how to help your gear recover from such emergency scenarios: